gali

The term ‘laptop’ suggests that such devices are designed to be used on your lap. They have a form factor that works quite well for this, light enough to balance with the keys and screen in sensible positions and sensible angles for relatively comfortable use.

However, anyone that’s had a laptop with a reasonable specification that’s used it for a prolonged period of time will realise that using it in this way – especially from bed with a thick duvet or blankets – can lead to quite a build-up of heat within the laptop. As well as leading to comfort issues, this has the potential to cause the laptop damage. My first laptop, with its powerful (at the time) hardware, required me to arrange for its graphics card to be replaced twice for reasons I presume to be heat related.

So, I got myself a bizarre plastic lap-shelf that raised my laptop up to about a 15 degree angle, such that there was room for airflow underneath, and therefore I could use it on my lap while keeping it away from any surface that might be good at storing heat.

I did glance at a few of these USB powered cooling pads that you can get, that boast various numbers of fans and other clever tricks to cool a laptop, but decided to avoid spending a lot of money for something a lot heavier than I needed for now. All was good for the years that followed.

More recently though, my new Gigabyte netbook I found seems to be quite good at producing heat. I suspect that each generation of netbook packs more and more power into a compact space, without improving the cooling too much.

My predicament was that my lap-shelf was designed to support my old 15.4″ laptop comfortably, and was just about a reasonable size for the 14″ laptop that followed. With a netbook, it is more awkward to balance and use due to the resulting steeper angle that the keyboard finds itself at, and all the excess plastic.

So I started looking at smaller cooling pads. However, my search was cut short by the revelation that in all my years of using laptops, I’ve never had one come close to overheating when used on a table or desk. It may seem obvious, but these devices were designed ultimately to be mobile computers, but still used in desk-based environments. The term ‘laptop’ was very much something that came from branding for popular culture.

The solution, inspired by (read: directly copied from) observing my housemate’s activities with his laptop, turned out to be a book. By placing a decent sized (ie. bigger than the base of the laptop) hardback book on my lap, and then placing my netbook on top of that, had the effect of simulating a flat surface like a desk, clear of materials that accumulate heat rapidly. The machine itself is built to allow just enough airflow that heat isn’t a problem when used on such a surface. The end result – no overheating lap, and no damaged laptop/netbook.

So, don’t be drawn in by the miracle heat cures of these expensive cooling pads. They’re a waste of money. Perhaps my laptop will still suffer heat damage over time, but so far every laptop I’ve ever owned is still functioning just fine…